"My Yoke is Easy, and My Burden is Light"

Tomorrow after I take my exam for my Civil War seminar, I will officially be finished with my first year of doctoral work!  On Tuesday, my Dad flies in to DFW, and then on Thursday he and I will set out for Utah, where I will be spending the summer doing research at the Church Archives, being with my family, and enjoying the ability to actually spend time with Julianne rather than having to talk to her over the phone.  In anticipation of the move, I have been packing up the contents of my room and doing a lot of thinking about the myriad of things I've experienced and the lessons I've learned since coming to Texas in August.

This past year has been full of plenty of ups and downs, triumphs and occasionally a few tragedies.  Through it all, I've learned to rely upon the Lord, my family, and my friends.  And I have learned just how much I can count upon each of them, no matter how much distance separates us.  Further, I have learned that I can be a support for family and friends in their struggles and trials, no matter how much distance separates us and no matter how busy my schedule may appear to be.

More than anything, however, I think I've been reminded that we can take the Lord at his word when we hear His promises to ease our heavy burdens and to make it possible for us to endure our trials.  Throughout our lives, He invites us, saying, "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.  For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light" (Matthew 11:28-30).

This semester has been the most stressful and challenging semester of my life.  The workload in my classes, the weight of my Church responsibilities, the loneliness of separation from loved ones, and a number of different challenges at home have been almost overwhelming.  But in the midst of all this, I've noticed something important.  It seemed that the Lord always lightened at least one or two of those burdens when one of them seemed to be too big to manage.  I have never had a busier semester in my life, and yet the Lord seemed to lighten the burden of my studies during a significant part of this semester when worries at home required my thoughts and prayers to be in Utah.  Uncharacteristically, I had moments in which writing seemed to come far easier than normal and reading went faster than usual.

Trusting that I did not magically obtain greater intellectual abilities than those that I am naturally endowed with, I must attribute these experiences to "the tender mercies of the Lord" which are "mighty even unto the power of deliverance" (1 Nephi 1:20).  For the first time in my life, I understand what the Lord meant when he promised Alma and the people of Helam that he would "ease the burdens which [were] put upon [their] shoulders, that even [they could not] feel them upon [their] backs" (Mosiah 24:14).  I have constantly been impressed with the Lord's use of anatomy to teach a powerful lesson in that verse.  The worst thing that you can do in carrying something heavy is to put the weight on your back, because backs are not built to carry weight.  And so the Lord helped Alma and his people to keep the burdens upon their shoulders and made those burdens bearable, for their shoulders could carry the weight that their backs could not.

In the case of Alma and his people, the Lord did not solve problems by removing burdens; He made them lighter and more manageable.  So it has been with me this semester.  The Lord did not remove my burdens; far from it.  But He did make sure that I didn't carry too much at once.  He made them lighter and He helped me to manage them.  As a result, I have grown through these trials and difficulties.  And so, like Alma and his people, I too have become a witness that "the Lord God [doth] visit [His] people in their afflictions" (Mosiah 24:14) and enables us to profit thereby.

Brett